When Agile just works

Amidst all the “Agile is dead” we see nowadays in LinkedIn, I decided to take Agile from a more positive light on this episode and retrieve from my mental archives moments that made this whole Agile journey worthwhile.

You know, those moments when everything aligns perfectly and flows so naturally it feels almost effortless. When frameworks stop being something you "do" and becomes something you simply "are." These are the moments that remind me why it wouldn’t have worked better any other way.

Let me share two personal stories that capture these moments perfectly!!!

Coding in a Taxi – A Teaching Kids Programming Startup

Many years back, as I stepped out from a contracting gig, I found myself joining this local Hong Kong startup that was teaching computer programming to kids. Imagine: energetic 8 to 15 year-olds learning to code as after school activity while their parents watched nervously from the side, hoping their little ones are the next Bill Gates or Steve Jobs. That was a big expectation 🙂 

The mission was inspiring on its own but the technical challenge was real. We needed a “App Store” platform that could be updated quickly and reliably and often on the fly. Kids being kids, they would find the most creative ways to break things or demand features that required immediate platform adjustments. Getting flooded with requests like "Why can't my picture be edited with filters?" or "Why are my App downloads still zero?" were my routine as CTO and Programming instructor at this startup.

Back to when the magic happened, given my focus on fast quality checks and even faster on-demand deployments, I built something beautiful, a codebase and CI/CD pipeline so reliable, that literally allowed me to update and deploy code while sitting in a taxi, heading to deliver a class.

I'm in the back of a Hong Kong taxi with the startup founder, traffic crawling at its usual pace, when I get a message from one of the instructors who was already at the venue where we would deliver the class. "Hey, the kids want to add sound effects to their App screenshots slideshow, but the current version doesn't have it. I know you were working on this last week, do you think we get this in before the next class starts in 30 minutes?"

In the old times, this would have been impossible and I would have said no right away. In an Agile world? I simply pulled out my laptop, picked up the latest code from github, made the code changes, ran our automated test suite (which completed in under 3 minutes), and deployed the update; all while watching the city pass by through the taxi window. By the time I walked into the school, the kids could have access to sound effects for their app slideshows.

This wasn't just about technology as it wasn't anything new or groundbreaking; it was about trust (in the quick feedback loops), and true agility (adapting to changes quickly). I knew I could respond instantly to feedback and fully trust it would work. The App store platform could evolve as fast as the students' and the startup needs. But more important than anything else, I was delivering joy, visible joy, to kids who were discovering the magic of programming and could also understand the impact of what I was doing.

Another beautiful thing? It even influenced the teaching curriculum and the parents started noticing too. Instead of seeing a rigid and static curriculum, they saw a responsive, adaptive learning program that actually fulfilled their children's curiosity.